


cloud atlas sextet

by incarnandine



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Crossover, Gen, M/M, Of sorts?, Other Fandoms Mentioned - Freeform, Reincarnation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-19
Updated: 2017-10-19
Packaged: 2019-01-19 20:55:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,413
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12417975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/incarnandine/pseuds/incarnandine
Summary: He'd lived a thousand lives; after he saw Arthur's departure to Avalon, he knew he was bound to wait until his king returns.And as time grew, his magic grew as well; after a hundred years he was able to change his face freely, as to be any man he wanted to. This proved useful on occasion, since as the country grew and peaceful villages fell place to bustling cities, people started to question the boy with blue eyes that never aged.(Inspired by the 2012Cloud Atlasmovie, and a load of other things.)





	cloud atlas sextet

He'd lived a thousand lives; after he saw Arthur's departure to Avalon, he knew he was bound to wait until his king returns.

And as time grew, his magic grew as well; after a hundred years he was able to change his face freely, as to be any man he wanted to. This proved useful on occasion, since as the country grew and peaceful villages fell place to bustling cities, people started to question the boy with blue eyes that never aged. He'd sailed ships, he'd flew baloons, he'd fought in wars and he'd created music, sculpture and art alike: and for all this time, he'd waited.

And he knew there were others waiting with him, alongside with him; all of them fated to serve the king that was and once again will be.

 

_**\---Rome, 1500** _

 

He walked the streets of a city so dirtied despite it's greatness; he'd seen the rise and fall of the greatest capital ever to be created, he'd seen its' rise a second time, this one to be a city under the reign of a religion that once had destroyed the old beliefs of his own people. Rome was full of people in the first days of autumn: the poor came to the city to sell their livestock, hoping to make money for the winter, the rich came to earn a favour of the mighty ruler - an if not him, his children.

Merlin at first came to explore; he heard news of people who dared travel across the seven seas to the other side of the world, and it was merely a matter of months before all of them came to the City, offering riches and wonders yet unknown in the old, musty countries of Europe. He longed to feel the novelty, the breath of a brand new life that he had only heard of.

Morgana was the one he had met instead. She was the first one to be seen since they all fell; and here she was, with a different face, a different name, spoke a language he understood only briefly, but the green eyes were still hers.

She was a man this time: the eldest son of the priest that ruled the city (ruled the world), a proud and brave prince in her own right. This time round she held her loyalty along with her pride, but the greed of power still slumbered inside; yet same as last time, she was confined to be whom she hated, struggling to get out and take her birthright as a fighter, not a man in red robes confined to prayer and repentment all of her life.

Merlin wanted to get close to her, as close as possible, if only to know what she would do. She did not remember; and deep down he was glad she didn't. Bound to her in the only way he could _(and could not admit how much he missed her, missed all of them)_ he became her advisor, her spy and her most trusted fighter all in one; supported her unrequited love as much as the unavoidable political marriage; and in the end her unavoidable downfall.

And yet he had cried for days when, seven years later, he'd heard news that the Duke of Valentinois had died in a war in faraway Spain.

 

_**\---Paris, 1832** _

 

It took him three hundred years to find another; and as much as tired he already was the unavoidable feeling of familiarity warmed his heart anew as he watched two faces so different ( _two hearts so perfectly alike_ ) from what was so hazy already in his memory.

Back in Paris, he chose the life of an elderly bookwriter - a botanist in his youth, as he always liked to freshen his knowledge on herbs, in the memory of Gaius if not anything else.

He'd kept a neat little house, lived the life he could afford -for he was never a man to keep interest in gold for longer than a century, and a rich life across the ocean became so boring after only twenty years; or in fact, he could not stand the slavery and the poverty that infested that world - with a wife he had - in a way - loved and cared for. She was aging, and he pretended to do so as well - until the day he went for a walk around the city ( _heard cries of an impending storm far away in the distance_ ) and in a young blonde man he saw the noblest knight that had ever lived.

Seeing Lancelot, so different and so alike at the same time was shock enough for him; he fought now as he had fought back then, had tried to change the world and help those around who could not fight for themselves - and yet, it was even more shocking to see the shadow that seemed to follow him and mirror him wherever he went.

And as Lancelot had remained unchanged in this life, so did Gwaine; the yearning for fun, a good drink and an even better fight was still in him along with the everlasting refuse to believe in anything that came his way. He loved women and men alike, he loved to get as drunk as humanly possible - and in a weird, twisted way he loved Lancelot as he had loved him all those centuries ago.

They were the only ones Merlin took pity on; with sheer willpower made them remember -and he was glad to do so, for he met them both only hours before both had died.

As he looked upon two bodies with fingers locked together and instead of a pair of young revolutionaries he saw his two closest friends, he kept back the tears. He'd remembered way too well that none of them would want him to cry for them - in any life that they were to live together.

 

_**\---Cambridge, 1930** _

 

Merlin didn't intend to enroll in an university ever again; he had degrees to fill the walls of entire rooms if he hadn't burned them time and over again, he had the knowledge and sageness that came from living so long on the expense of his hand whenever he wanted. He played the piano on a whim now - pretended to be a young man, his face only slightly changed (after 1832, he lived a century with his own eyes looking back at him from every mirror, and this was slowly becoming a dangerous affair if he intended to stay in Europe), composed music and for the first time in so long yearned for a real adventure.

Passing through the small universitary town on a cold winter evening, he saw a whiff of straw blonde hair and his heart had stopped.

The man he met was not Arthur, and yet he could well be; the nobility in his face and the warmth in his blue, blue eyes was enough to deceive. So he'd stayed, he fell in love with the man that was Arthur-not-Arthur, and only felt the lack of recognition on sunny mornings when he realized over and over again that those blue eyes were not blue enough. And when the pain got unbearable, he had left for Zedelghem, to work for a man so famed who could teach him things he had not yet learned.

Still, he had a feeling that he owed his lover something - anything - so he wrote him letters. In a fit of desperacy he tried to shoot himself in the mouth ( _stupid, stupid Merlin; how many times had you tried and yet not learned that you cannot die?_ ), effectively faking his own death.

As he saw his old lover in an American hotel lobby 50 years later, still living and successful, and so in love with a dream from years gone by, he breathed a sigh of relief.

 

_**\---London, 2013** _

 

Another century had passed and he didn't even bother to change his face. A feeling rumbled deep inside his chest, a feeling he stopped hoping he'd ever encounter again after that time he saw not-Arthur in Cambridge. He kept a small bookstore and a fat grey cat. And he waited.

When the old-fashioned bell rang one Thursday morning, Merlin came face to face with a pair of blue eyes and a crooked smile; a face he'd waited for and a man he swore never to lose again.

"Merlin! And here you are, how long did you think you could hide from me, stupid?"

_I've finally found you._

 

**Author's Note:**

> cookies to all of you who found the Borgias/Les Mis references
> 
> i'm also on [tumblr](http://incarnandine.tumblr.com) if you want to talk merthur with me!


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